Pitch Black
by jojoandpicnic97
Summary: Eyes are windows to the soul. Eye-mates were two people who had the exact same colors and patterns in their irises. Every child in the world would yearn for the day they turned thirteen so they could begin their search for their eye-mate. Johnlock


John Watson had been waiting for his thirteenth birthday his entire life. Not because he reached his teen years, but because he would finally get color in his eyes.

Every child in the world was always born with pitch black irises. On the day of their thirteenth birthday, a color would appear and swish around the iris until it settled. Of course, they didn't settle right away and having a solid eye color was extremely rare. The color would soon become two in most cases, and every time the child stepped closer to their destined another color would appear. The colors only settled when the two eye-mates first made eye contact.

So, naturally, John was excited for the day he would first lock eyes with the person he was destined to love for the rest of his life. And on the eve of his thirteenth birthday, he was bouncing all over the walls of his home, wondering what color he would attain the next day.

"Pink," he asked aloud. "Pink is good, yeah, Mum?"

"Yes, John," she sighed for the umpteenth time that night. "And so is red, and yellow, and violet, and every other bloody colour you've asked about."

John frowned, looking into her periwinkle-evergreen-ultramarine blue diamond-patterned eyes. "But _Muuumm_, I want bright colours! Bright colours mean a really happy life!"

It was her turn to frown. "John, I have dull colours and I have a very happy life."

"Ultramarine is kinda bright."

She gave him a small smile. "Go to sleep and find out what colour you have in the morning." He nodded a bit glumly and turned away from her to go to his room. "And, John," he looked back, "Remember that you can't always get what you want. I know _I _wanted a solid colour, but that was a very high hope indeed." John smiled and said good night to his mother before going to his room to sleep.

When he woke up the next morning, he immediately got up and went to the bathroom to see the color in his irises in the mirror hanging above the sink. _This is it_, he thought to himself, _I'll finally have a colour like all my other friends_.

Looking into the mirror, however, he was gravely disappointed.

"_Nothing_," he whispered. "They're still black." He was horrified. How was it that there was no color swirling around at all? What had he done wrong? Why was he the only person to ever wake up on their thirteenth birthday and not have a color floating around in their irises? Did he have no one to love?

Upon seeing his still black irises, John's family was dumbfounded, concerned, and shocked. John's friends were weirded out. And society as a whole alienated him. Him, the grown man who still had pitch black eyes.

With not much else to do, as he had no eye-mate waiting for him anytime soon, he decided to join the military. The military did not ask questions, did not care; the only thing that mattered to the military was how well John healed his patients. And when he was shot in the shoulder, they sent him back to London.

* * *

Sherlock Holmes was hardly looking forward to the day he would have to turn thirteen years old. His brother Mycroft always reminded him that he would not be immune to attaining colors, as Mycroft himself had not been immune.

It was the eve of his thirteenth birthday and he wasn't looking forward to staring in the mirror the next day to see an annoying color swishing without a care in the world in his otherwise black irises. He didn't care what color was there – his parents would, though. They had taught him everything he knew about eye-mates.

The patterns the colors made were of no consequence – they were there just to be there. Bright colors signified excitement and bickering. Dull colors signified stability and romance. Warm colors signified passion and comfort. Cool colors signified deep understanding and distance. Solid colors, however, meant everything all at once. It did not matter if the color was bright, dull, warm, or cool; if eye-mates had a solid color, then their love was the truest of all true loves. There was excitement, bickering, stability, and romance. There was passion, comfort, deep understanding, and distance. There was a reason they were rare and Sherlock thought they were dreadfully boring.

"Oh, Sherlock, I hope you have a warm colour," his mother gushed, hugging her son as he sat still before his desk. He had been evaluating a prominent serial killer case that was ongoing. Quite frankly, he wondered how the police had failed to catch the man so far. "But a dull colour like Mycroft's wouldn't be that bad either."

"Well, we will find out tomorrow, won't we," Sherlock responded.

His mother nodded. "Any colour will do," she said. "I just hope your life with your eye-mate will be a happy one."

Sherlock snorted and smirked at his mother. "Studies show that all eye-mate relationships are happy, Mother. There is no need at all to worry about that."

She laughed. "I know. I'm just excited."

When she looked into her son's eyes the next morning, all of her excitement drained away. Mycroft stared into them with shock. His father didn't know what to do.

Sherlock stared back at them with trepidation. "Perhaps my eyes are to remain black," he said, as if that would ease their concerns away.

It was a good thing, wasn't it? That his eyes were still black? That he wouldn't have to worry about keeping some person happy for the rest of his life? Some part of his brain was disappointed though, but Sherlock knew that the emotion was illogical and that his eye-mate (or his would-be eye-mate) was most likely a boring and ordinary person like everyone else.

He was still disappointed, though.

He pushed that aside and went about his life. He became the world's only consulting detective and the punch line of many of New Scotland Yard's workers' jokes due to his eyes being as 'black as his heart.' But Sherlock was quite content with his life in 221B Baker Street, even if he was in desperate need of a flat mate.

Who would ever want to be flat mates with him, anyway?

* * *

Mike Stamford was definitely not a person John was expecting to see again. It was a crazy, random happenstance, but it changed John's life forever, and for the better.

He had been walking around London when he had heard someone call his name. They exchanged pleasantries, along with how John had got shot, end of story. Not to mention, John needed a flat mate, for an unemployed soldiers' budget called for one. "Who would want me as a flat mate," he had asked Mike.

Mike then told him he was the second person he had heard that from that day. With a smile, Mike took John to meet the first.

Walking into a lab in St. Bart's Hospital, John expected to meet a scientist or another doctor perhaps. He wasn't expecting the man bent over a microscope, asking if he could borrow Mike's phone, which Mike had forgotten, and John offered his. This prompted the man to glance at him and ask if he had been on tour in Afghanistan or Iraq. John looked up at the man who was now looking back into the microscope. "Sorry?"

"Afghanistan or Iraq?" The man met his gaze and John realized with a start that he was staring into pitch black eyes.

**A/N: First time writing for Sherlock. Nice and simple; did I write them write? Is it okay?**


End file.
